


Like Hell

by Ghost_in_the_Hella



Series: To All of You (prompt fills) [22]
Category: The Locked Tomb Trilogy | Gideon the Ninth Series - Tamsyn Muir
Genre: F/F, Flirting, Lesbian Disaster Gideon Nav, Prompt Fill, gets a bit rude because Gideon, very sweary
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-12
Updated: 2020-12-12
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:27:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,468
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28032396
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ghost_in_the_Hella/pseuds/Ghost_in_the_Hella
Summary: Gideon has passed out. Surely, this must be what has happened. She’ll wake up in her nest of black blankets with a dirty magazine glued to her face by skull paint and drool, completely covered in sticky notes blackened with Harrowhark’s vitriol. Because it sure as hell feels like Coronabeth - Coronabeth Tridentarius, crown Princess of Ida, hottest necromancer this side of the funny books - is flirting with her.---Corona flirts. Gideon flails. Turns out she'll let a beautiful woman get away with just about anything.
Relationships: Gideon Nav/Coronabeth Tridentarius, Gideon Nav/dirty magazines
Series: To All of You (prompt fills) [22]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1656067
Comments: 16
Kudos: 29





	Like Hell

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ItsaVikingThing](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ItsaVikingThing/gifts).



> ItsaVikingThing prompted me on [tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/ghost-in-the-hella)  
> with "You look like hell" and Gideon the Ninth. There were so many directions this prompt could've gone, and yet this is where it ended up...

“You look like hell.”

Gideon startles at the sound of Coronabeth Tridentarius actually speaking to her. She sounds more intrigued than judgemental, as if hell were an exotic travel destination she’s not yet been to but is eager to learn more about. Gideon is, not for the first time, grateful for her affected vow of silence as all possibility of coherent thought abandons her tongue. She would surely be a stuttering gay mess if she tried to speak to a woman as beautiful as this particular princess of Ida. With her feigned vow, she can still pull off the “strong but silent” affect and at least somewhat salvage the impression of being a suave badass who’s great with the ladies.

Or she could if she weren’t currently a panting, heaving, sweat drenched, bone dust coated, blood smeared, tattered mess.

It figures that Harrow doesn’t even have to be in the same room with Gideon to have completely ruined her game. Gideon draws herself up to her full height and squares her shoulders - fighting the urge to slump into an exhausted heap on the floor - and straightens her crooked aviators. She hopes that her face paint is still a badass skull and not a runny mess of gray; they’re not big on mirrors down in the facility. Her spine stiffens as Coronabeth steps toward her, smiling like they’re sharing a secret, and brushes one perfect hand lightly at each of Gideon’s shoulders, scattering fine chips of bone onto the floor.

“Poor thing,” Coronabeth purrs, locking Gideon in place with intense eye contact even through her shades. “Your necro’s really running you ragged, isn’t she?”

The last thing Gideon wants to talk about while a beautiful woman is touching her - actually touching her! Okay, touching the shoulders of her robes, but _still_! - is her screeching ferret of a necromancer. Her distaste must show in her expression even through the caked on layers of sweaty paint because Coronabeth chuckles prettily and squeezes her shoulder - Gideon tenses her sick delts reflexively, desperate to please - and gives her a conspiratorial smirk. “That’s alright. I won’t ask you to divulge any forbidden secrets about the Ninth House or the trials.” She runs clever fingers around the hem of Gideon’s hood - a rumpled heap around her neck, having fallen down as she heaved herself up the ladder from the facility in a hurry to get herself to a sonic - and winks suggestively enough that Gideon swallows hard. “She really must be putting you through the ringer. You know, I feel quite sorry for you cavs sometimes. So much is asked of you, and you get so little in return…”

Gideon has passed out. Surely, this must be what has happened. She’ll wake up in her nest of black blankets with a dirty magazine glued to her face by skull paint and drool, completely covered in sticky notes blackened with Harrowhark’s vitriol. Because it sure as hell feels like Coronabeth - Coronabeth Tridentarius, crown Princess of Ida, hottest necromancer this side of the funny books - is flirting with her. With _her_. Gideon Nav, indentured servant of the Ninth, perpetually demeaned cavalier primary to her lifelong nemesis, hottest cavalier in history to never touch a boob that wasn’t her own. With her stupid, itchy black robes that still smell faintly of Ortus Nigenad’s flop sweat no matter how many times they’re laundered, with her overgrown and uncombed hair all full of cobwebs and bone dust, with her half-melted face paint of a creepy fucking skull not quite concealing her latest acne outbreak. So there’s no fucking way that this isn’t some delightful dream inspired by too many titty mags before bedtime.

Coronabeth’s hand slides down from Gideon’s shoulder, gliding down the length of her arm - trailing over the firm roundness of her deltoid, the jaw-dropping perfection of her biceps, the corded extensor muscles of her forearms - down to seize her calloused hand with her own surprisingly strong one. “I think you deserve something in return. Don’t you?” 

Okay. New thought. Maybe Gideon hasn’t passed out, but she’s probably going to if Coronabeth keeps touching her like this.

Gideon nods very carefully, trying not to let any drool drop from her mouth.

Coronabeth’s smile is as bright as Dominicus. She tugs Gideon’s hand and leads her down an unfamiliar hallway. Gideon follows obediently despite her necromancer’s warnings ringing in her head, shrieking at her to trust no one. Well, Gideon figures, if she’s a lamb being led to the slaughter, at least she’ll die happy. A girl’s holding her hand! Flirting with her! Smiling at her! Touching her muscles! 

Much to Gideon’s surprise, she is not promptly jumped and flesh magicked to death upon entry to the Third’s quarters. In fact, as far as she can tell, she’s alone in them with Coronabeth. Sure, she had to offer up a bit of blood to the gross ward on the door, but she’s already bleeding a little bit from her adventures in the facility anyway so that’s no biggie. 

She’s relieved to note that there are two big, ostentatious beds in addition to the smaller (but no less ostentatious) cavalier bed at the foot of one. If by some miracle she does get laid today, she’d really rather it not be in a bed that Ianthe Tridentarius has also slept or - God forbid - boned in. Coronabeth hustles her past the beds (dang) toward a large and opulent bathroom. “Here, get washed up.”

A fluffy purple towel is thrust into Gideon’s hands, there’s a gentle shove at her shoulders and the click of a door shutting, and suddenly Gideon is alone in the fanciest bathroom she’s ever seen. It’s even more ridiculous than the one in the Ninth’s quarters. She catches her own reflection in the mirror and finds that she looks every inch as confused as she is. “What the fuck?” she mouths to herself.

“I don’t hear washing happening!” comes Coronabeth’s mellifluous voice sing-songing through the door.

Gideon Nav fancies herself a remarkably strong person, the kind of person who could move mountains barehanded if she set her mind to it. Apparently, she has one fatal weakness: a beautiful woman telling her to do, well, literally anything. So Gideon obligingly scours the paint off her face - Harrow’ll be furious, but Harrow’s _always_ furious and her paint’s a mess anyway - and inspects herself once more in the mirror. Sexy. Hot. Gorgeous. Little bit of acne at the hairline and around the left nostril, bit ruddy-cheeked from over-scrubbing, but still a flawless masterpiece of hotness. 

She sniffs her armpits. Pretty sweaty. Are chicks into that? If they’re going to bone (please, please, please) then won’t she get sweaty again anyway?

Wait, _are_ they going to bone? They are, right? They’re alone in Corona’s quarters, her terrifying sister and their insufferable cav have clearly been sent away, and Corona’s super hot and bossing her around and dragging her into her bedroom (well, through her bedroom to her bathroom, but still). If this were one of Gideon’s magazines she’d already be up to her wrist, or at least majorly winning at tonsil hockey. This is literally a textbook scenario for boning.

Okay, then. It’s _on_. So now what? Should she brush her teeth or something? Her breath’s probably pretty rank after the morning she’s had. Should she, like… shave stuff? 

“You may draw a bath, if you like,” Corona calls through the door again. “Ianthe and Babs will be gone for _hours_. And something tells me that you have never been pampered.”

And so Gideon ends up taking the first ever bath of her life in the gilded bathtub of the Third. She can’t bring herself to fill the tub more than a couple of inches, even though from her skin mags and her comics she knows a bath is usually filled until the person in it is all but drowning, or at least until the bubbles are tastefully covering the good bits (comics) or just barely not covering them (skin mags). She does throw in several of the weird perfumy things hanging out around the tub at Corona’s urging. By the end of it, she’s pretty sure she’s dirtier than when she stepped in except that now she’s filthy with scented soaps and salts and glittery “bath bombs” (surprisingly not that violent but also surprisingly messy) instead of sweat and blood. She scrapes and scrubs at herself and then gives her body and her clothes a good shake out in the sonic for good measure. She borrows some toothpaste and uses her finger as a toothbrush, then rinses with borrowed mouthwash. 

There’s a fluffy purple and gold robe that smells a bit like Corona’s perfume and seems the right size, so even though it’s a million miles off from her usual aesthetic she consents to shrug it on. It’s impossibly soft and warm and smooth. Stops a bit short on her thighs, but presumably that won’t get any complaints.

When she steps back out into the Third’s quarters, Gideon feels strangely vulnerable without her protective layer of filth. She smells like a stranger, and her fingertips and toes are wrinkled in a weird way that she assumes has to do with the bath bombs or maybe with how hard she was scrubbing. That, or she’s picked up some freaky skin disease from the Third’s bathtub. She hopes she’s not about to die or something.

Corona looks beyond delighted to see her emerge, ruddy and steaming, from the bathing chamber in her ludicrous little bathrobe. It’s a shame that it’s short on the leg coverage and heavy on the arm coverage, since Gideon’s legs are fucking awesome but not nearly as impressive as her guns. She wants to ask what Corona has planned for her now, but her stupid oath to Harrow stays her tongue. If all goes well, Coronabeth might have a better use for her tongue than words, anyway. So instead she stands there trying to look impressive rather than panicky and overstimulated.

“Come here,” Corona beckons with an elegant finger, her eyes glittering like shards of polished amethyst. Gideon’s pretty sure that Corona’s not using any necromantic tricks on her - she knows what that shit feels like by now, and it’s vastly unpleasant - but she follows her gesture as inexorably as if Corona were looping a leash of thanergy around her throat and dragging her closer. 

And then Coronabeth Tridentarius is _touching_ her. Like, pretty much _everywhere_. “Hmmm, let’s see,” she murmurs thoughtfully as she palpates what feels like every trembling inch of Gideon’s being (apart from the good bits, but maybe this is what foreplay is? she’s heard of it, but her magazines usually skip straight to the main event). Instead of trying to think, Gideon focuses on feeling, which is much more in her wheelhouse.

Corona’s nimble fingers carding through her damp red locks (they could stand a trim), fingernails sending tingles through her scalp as they scratch gently against skin that’s never been touched in kindness before. Fingertips trailing down the strong line of her jaw, gently seizing her square chin and turning her face to every possible angle, her gaze as palpable as her fingers. Strong hands (how does the Princess of Ida have actual calluses on her fingers?) testing her muscles, examining her hands and paying particular attention to her fingernails (they could also stand a trim).

“You look good in my robe,” Corona announces, taking a step back and allowing Gideon to breathe for what feels like the first time since she set foot in her quarters. “Gold suits you.” She locks eyes with Gideon and quirks her lips into a subtle smirk. “Gold suits you _very_ well.”

Gideon swallows hard, trying not to gulp audibly and concentrating on not sweating through her borrowed robe.

“ _Much_ better than black. Not that you look bad in black, mind you, but there are other colors that would be much more flattering for your lovely complexion.”

She takes Gideon by the hand and leads her over to an over-decorated table that Gideon observes is overflowing with cosmetics. “For example… Hmmm… Plum?” Corona holds up a tube of something that’s a deep, bruised purple, examining its contrast with Gideon’s skin. “Or perhaps mauve…”

Coronabeth is insatiable. Gideon is left exhausted. When she finally emerges from the Third House’s quarters (very much not laid), hours have passed and she feels as if she has run a marathon. Not from any outward exertion, but from the effort of holding still and keeping silent throughout the whole ordeal.

She is perhaps the most sexually frustrated she has ever been in her life, having never been touched by a woman (and what a woman!) so much before, or really at all before unless she counts herself or the shriveled crones of the Ninth.

She is also… well. Made over. Her hair has been combed and styled, and it reeks of hair gel almost as badly as Naberius Tern’s does on an average day. Her nails have been trimmed, filed, and buffed smooth before being painted a soft lilac and accented with shimmering gold. Her face has been rendered utterly unrecognizable; Harrowhark would likely envy the sheer amount of makeup on it if only it were in the design of a skull rather than whatever peacocky nonsense Coronabeth’s done to it. She is, at least, in her own black robes despite Coronabeth’s best efforts to get her to borrow some of Babs’s gaudy frippery.

She suspects she has, in fact, been fucked by the Third after all.

She slinks down the hall as stealthily as she can manage, thanking her lucky stars that her necro is probably half-dead in a bone or buried up to her pointy little goblin ears in ancient books or possibly both rather than being a normal, decent human being who might give a fuck where her cavalier has vanished off to for hours on end with one of her greatest rivals. She’s hoping that everyone else in Canaan House will be equally preoccupied and that she’ll be able to return to the safety of her chambers with her dignity at least partially intact when she rounds a corner and nearly faceplants directly into the solid mass of Camilla the Sixth.

Gideon draws herself up to her fullest and most imposing posture and tries to mask her humiliation as best she can. Camilla observes her cooly, but Gideon swears her fellow cav is just barely holding back a laugh. 

After a small but excruciating eternity in limbo, Camilla steps aside to let Gideon dart gratefully past. Camilla casts a few words over her shoulder as Gideon passes, and they follow her burning ears all the way down the hall and back to her quarters: “You look like hell, Nav.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to ItsaVikingThing for the prompt and to all of you for reading! HMU on [tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/ghost-in-the-hella) for more prompts and other fandom funtimes. Comments and kudos are always greatly appreciated!


End file.
